100 Book Challenge

  

     My name is Davie Sanchez. I am currently in the second year of my pursuit of a career in Computer Science. My primary interest are music and basketball. To be candid, I randomly chose this class for no particular reason other than process of elimination with the other options I had available. That being said, I do hope to further improve my understanding and respark my immersion with literature.

    My earliest memory of actively choosing and reading books independently was from the second or third grade. There was something called the One Hundred Book Challenge where every kid in my school would have a log of every book they finished and once you passed a certain amount verified by the teacher you would get a new folder. Each folder had a different primary color, and the following next folder always had a more popular color. Once you get past one hundred books, you would get an all black folder with a ring of fire around the logo. I never got that far because I spent far more time playing kickball with friends, but it definitely served as a proponent to make me read more. 

    From the third grade onward, I recall my school having a book fair on every Report Card night. If I had good grades, my parents would give me money for one book and an accessory like a bookmark or one of those invisible writing pens with the UV light on the cap. At this point my primary infatuation literature wise was towards books with addendums or supplementary features aside from the words on paper such as uncut edges, a hard cover, or a well-designed cover. One book I vividly remember purchasing and still have to this day came with a small compartment on the inside with a map of the world that existed in the story. I thought it was pretty cool at the time, and honestly still do. Admittedly, it is a bit of a cheat code to circumvent having to visualize the world solely through the descriptions in the text.

      One day when I was around eleven years old while my family was driving to an Italian restaurant in Clifton we would go to at least 4 times a year when I noticed a Barnes and Nobles and pleaded with my father to stop at after we ate. To this day it is probably the largest book store I have ever been in. There was a coffee shop inside which I had never seen within a book store before and escalators that went to a second floor also layered with book shelves. I must've spent thirty minutes exploring every crevice in that store prior to even looking at a book and I left with three books. This time I was intrigued by the descriptions of the books and not because it had a holographic cover or came with cards of all the characters.

    I don't recall any memories of reading with family, so I believe it was more independent driven reading in elementary. Reading became a much larger point of focus in middle school. My school was a hybrid middle/high school, so the style of teaching and prevalence of literature was similar from year to year. Summer reading assignments shifted from a series of individual assignments to reading a book which would lead to reading exams, papers, and general discussions when school started again. The books that stand out to me from middle to high school were Bud not Buddy, Fahrenheit 451, Lord of the Flies, and Animal Farm. These aren't the most difficult books I recall reading at the time, only ones that I was forced to read for an assignment and afterward retained a greater appreciation for.

    In late middle school and early high school I was assigned many college level books which I found captivating. The reason being that it was far above my level of reading comprehension at the time. This was obviously intentional, and I found myself reading more and more not out of interest for the contents of the pages, but simply to increase my level of understanding. My freshman year I had 2 classes on Greek literature centered around mythology and tragedies. Reading one's own work was initially taught and reinforced by school in order to catch errors, but I also just enjoyed reading my own work. Covid kicked off during my last two years of high school, and classes became HyFlex. Many instructors opted not to utilize zoom for lectures. While literature was already a huge portion of my education, even receiving the instructions for the actual literature assignments now involved more reading and individual understanding, as there was less emphasis on verbal explanation and discussion. If you misinterpreted the instructions for an assignment, despite your best effort, you could lose out on points. 

    All adults do some forms of reading throughout the day however in terms of long reading sessions outside of college assignments, that mainly consist of articles pertaining to current events or topics I find interesting at the time. Also, song lyrics, as I tend to enjoy music that is narratively focused or heavy on rhyme schemes. I don't believe I have read a book outside of school in years. The foremost barrier being time. Not only lack of time, but as to how I wish to spend the little time I have.